The club was founded on 18 March 1989 as Ilhwa Chunma Football Club[1] with the club based in Seoul. The club was successful from its beginning, winning its first League Cup three years later in 1992 and winning three consecutive league titles from 1993 to 1995. But the club was forced to move in 1996, as part of the K League's decentralization policy. This policy was carried out due to two reasons - the first reason was that the KFA and the K League wanted to build a soccer-specific stadium in Seoul and the second reason was that the KFA and the K League wanted to spread football fever to the provinces. The three clubs based in Seoul - Ilhwa Chunma, LG Cheetahs, Yukong Elephants didn't accept this policy, resulting in the Korean government giving eviction orders to the 3 clubs. However, they guaranteed if the clubs built a soccer-specific stadium in Seoul, they could have a Seoul franchise and then return to Seoul. As a result, three clubs were evicted from Seoul to other cities, Ilhwa Chunma moved to the city of Cheonan and changed its name to Cheonan Ilhwa Chunma.

Several unsuccessful seasons followed, and when they finished at the bottom of the league for the second consecutive time in 1999, the club moved to the Seoul satellite city of Seongnam and renamed themselves Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma. The move worked out very well, as the rejuvenated club went on to win three consecutive K League titles from 2001 to 2003.

A disappointing 2004 campaign saw them meekly relinquish their title. However, they reached the final of the 2004 AFC Champions League, where despite winning the away leg 3-1, they lost the home leg 5-0 to Saudi Arabian club Al-Ittihad and lost the tie 6-3 on aggregate.

The club bounced back to the forefront of Korean football in style as they claimed their seventh league title in 2006, defeating Suwon Samsung Bluewings 3-1 on aggregate in the championship playoff final. This was their 7th K League title which is a record out of all the K League clubs.

Before they were defeated by Suwon Bluewings 2-1 on 15 July 2007 in the 2007 season, they had not lost for 22 consecutive league matches - the third longest streak in the history of the K League.

In 2008, they moved their home stadium to Seongnam 1 Stadium for their summer season, due to the rebuilding of Tancheon Sports Complex. However, due to the delay of the reconstruction of Tancheon Sports Complex they returned to their home stadium.

During the 2013 season, there were rumors that the club was going to be sold to Ansan. This rumor was supported after the organization that was running the club, Unification Church's founder Sun-Myoung Moon who was extremely devoted to football has died. The Unification Church's board of directors saw no reason to continue running the club and stated their thoughts on selling the club to another organization. After the rumor was reported by the press, Ansan's mayor stated officially that the city is on a process of purchasing the club from Ilhwa. Estimated number of 800 supporters (SF1080, YRU, YFboys and Ultras Giovani) protested in front of the Seongnam city hall stating an importance on preserving the most successful club in the Asian football's history. On October 2013, Seongnam's mayor Lee, Jae-Myung had a conference and stated that the Club will be sold to Seongnam City Government and will be participating under the name, Seongnam FC.[4]

The club played the first home game as Seongnam FC on March 15th, 2014 against FC Seoul resulting in a draw of 0:0.